Red Herring - Say What?!
Clip: Season 2023 | 4m 37sVideo has Closed Captions
Explore the historical origins and popular culture integration of the idiom "red herring."
The saying "red herring" means something that distracts you from what's really important. Join our Say What?! detective on the case of this suspicious saying, as they uncover an old story about training hunting dogs with smelly herring fish.
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Camp TV is a local public television program presented by THIRTEEN PBS
Red Herring - Say What?!
Clip: Season 2023 | 4m 37sVideo has Closed Captions
The saying "red herring" means something that distracts you from what's really important. Join our Say What?! detective on the case of this suspicious saying, as they uncover an old story about training hunting dogs with smelly herring fish.
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Learn Moreabout PBS online sponsorship[bright music] [playful music] - [Narrator] Have you ever heard of a "red herring"?
Any idea what that means?
- Never heard of it.
An injured bird?
- [Kid] Is it a bird or a fish?
It's a fish, right?
- [Narrator] Well, a herring is a fish, yes.
But we'll get to that in a second.
[suspenseful music] The saying "red herring" means something that distracts you from what's really important.
Like in a mystery story when the detective finds a clue that seems really valuable.
- [Narrator] "The Case of the Suspicious Saying."
- [Detective] My chances of solving this case were about as good as fish knowing my birthday.
When suddenly, what's this?
I uncovered a crumb of a clue.
Actually, they were potato chip crumbs.
Mmm, delicious.
Obviously, I would need to question everyone at the nearby potato chip factory.
- [Narrator] But it turns out that the clue has nothing to do with solving the mystery.
- [Assistant] No, no, boss, that was your snack from earlier.
[Detective sighs] - [Narrator] That's a red herring!
And they're often used in stories to keep the audience on their toes and make it harder to figure out what's going on.
- [Detective] But what in the world does the saying "red herring" have to do with a red fish?
- [Narrator] Well, to answer that, let's start with British fishermen in the 1700's.
- [Fisherman] [sighs] We've got herring again.
- [Narrator] Herring was one of the most widely caught fish at the time.
- [Detective] But that herring isn't red, it's silver!
- [Narrator] Right, because before refrigerators, people used to dry out the fish so it wouldn't spoil, which turned the silver herring to a more reddish color, and also quite stinky.
- [Detective] I knew something smelled fishy!
- [Narrator] Now, there are different ideas about how "red herring" became a saying.
But a popular one is that a few hundred years ago, people would train dogs with excellent senses of smell to help them hunt animals like foxes.
And as part of the training, people would drag smelly red herrings in the opposite direction of the fox.
- To teach us to not get distracted by the fishy smell in the wrong direction.
[dramatic music] - [Narrator] Some even think criminals found this useful.
- [Prisoner] Joe, drag the red herring on the ground to throw them off our trail.
- [Detective] Freeze like a fish stick, you slippery scoundrels!
- [Narrator] The first time the saying appeared in print was way back in 1807.
- Hello.
- When the British writer William Cobbett told a story about when he was a young boy.
- [William] I used a red herring to throw hunting dogs off the trail of a poor, innocent rabbit.
- [Narrator] A longer version of the story was printed a few years later and the saying seems to have caught on.
- [Woman] I keep hearing about this catchy new expression -- "red herring."
- [Woman] Oh, saying "red herring" is very big right now.
- [Narrator] But in a really interesting example of how investigating sayings has many twists and turns, it was recently suggested that hunters actually trained their horses, not their dogs, with red herring.
- And the fish helped us get used to the weird smells you smell on hunts.
It wasn't about leading us down the wrong path.
[horse neighs] - [Narrator] And as for that British writer from 1807... - [Detective] Maybe he also believed the old tales about hunting dogs.
- [Narrator] It's cool that a saying can become a popular saying because somebody first wrote it down and lots of people understand what it means.
- [Detective] Eureka!
Even if red herrings weren't used to distract hunting dogs, we have all long agreed that the saying "red herring" means something that leads you down the wrong path.
[crowd cheering] - [Narrator] How about you?
Can you think of any movies or books that use red herrings to make you think one thing about a character or a situation, but later it turns out not to be true?
[upbeat music] - [Detective] Solving that case has made me hungry.
How about a quick snack of red herring?
- [Narrator] Yeah, I could use the distraction.
[upbeat music]
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